XIX
How the Doctor Was Placed in a Terrible Dilemma
But just as the most beautiful summer days are sometimes abruptly spoilt by a fearful storm, so the Doctor’s happiness was suddenly marred by a most awful possibility. He had found the being for whom he had been searching, certainly: but alas! it was only a monkey. Without doubt they would be able to understand each other, but they could never converse. The Doctor fell back from heaven to earth. Farewell to those long interviews from which he had hoped to gain so much, farewell to that wonderful crusade which they were to have undertaken together—the crusade against superstition! For, battling alone, the Doctor would not possess weapons adequate to overthrow the hydra of ignorance. He needed a man, an apostle, a confessor, a martyr—a role which could scarcely be filled by a monkey! What was he to do? A menacing voice rang in his ears—“Kill him.” Heraclius trembled. In a second he realized that if he killed the monkey the soul thus freed would immediately enter the body of an infant on the point of birth, and that it would then be necessary to wait at least twenty years before that infant reached maturity, by which time the Doctor would be seventy. It was possible, certainly. But could he be sure of tracing the man? Moreover, his religion forbade him to do away with any living being under penalty of committing a murder: therefore, if he did this his soul would pass after death into the body of a ferocious animal, as was decreed for a murderer. What did it matter? Would he not be a victim of science—of his faith? He seized an enormous Turkish scimitar which was hanging against some tapestry and, like Abraham on the mountain, was about to strike, when a sudden thought restrained him. Supposing this man’s sins were not yet expiated, and supposing his soul returned for a second time into the body of a monkey instead of passing into that of a child? This was possible, probable even, nearly certain in fact. In thus committing a futile crime, the Doctor would condemn himself to a terrible punishment without benefiting his fellow-men. Worn out, he dropped back into his chair. Such long drawn out emotion had exhausted him, and he fainted.
XX
In Which the Doctor Has a Little Talk with His Servant
When he opened his eyes it was seven o’clock, and Honorine was bathing his temples with vinegar. The Doctor’s first thought was for his monkey, but the animal had disappeared.
“My monkey, where’s my monkey?” he exclaimed.
“Yes, it’s about time we did talk about him,” retorted the servant, who was also a mistress and was always ready to lose her temper. “A bad thing for him to be lost, is it? A pretty creature, upon my word! He mimics everything he sees you do. Didn’t I find him trying on your boots the other day? And then this morning, when I picked you up here—and God knows what mad ideas you’ve got into your head lately—anyhow they prevent your having a decent night’s rest—this wretched creature—devil, rather, in the form of a monkey—had put on your skullcap and your dressing gown. He was looking at you and seemed to be laughing, as though it was a huge joke to see a man who had fainted. Then, when I tried to get near, the brute went for me as though he wanted to eat me, but, thank heavens, I’m not frightened of him and I’ve got a good pair of hands. I fetched the shovel to him and I hit him so hard on his ugly back that he ran away into your room. He’s probably up to some other mischievous trick there now.”
“You hit my monkey!” roared the exasperated Doctor. “Understand this, my good woman, from now onwards he’s to be respected and waited on like the master of the house.”
“Well, well, he’s not only the master of the house, he’s the master of the master, too, and has been for a long time past,” grumbled Honorine, as she went off to her kitchen, convinced that Doctor Heraclius Gloss was certainly mad.
XXI
In Which It Is Shown That a Dearly-Loved Friend Can Lighten the Heaviest Sorrow
As the doctor had said, from that day onward the monkey was really master of the house, and Heraclius became the animal’s humble valet. He thought of him with infinite tenderness for hours at a time, acted towards him with the thoughtfulness of a lover, lavished on him a whole dictionary of tender phrases, clasped his hand as one clasps that of a friend. When talking to him, he looked earnestly at him and explained the points in his arguments which might have been obscure. In fact he surrounded the creature’s entire life with gentle care and delicate attention.
But the monkey accepted it all as calmly as a god receiving the homage of its worshippers. Heraclius, like all great minds living in solitude, isolated by their sublimity above the common level of foolishness of ordinary people, had up till then felt himself alone.
